


here i am

by ataxophilia



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Beverly Katz is the Best, F/M, Future Fic, set sometime after hannibal's arrest, will's been in hospital
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-22
Updated: 2014-03-22
Packaged: 2018-01-16 13:10:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1348633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ataxophilia/pseuds/ataxophilia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She shouldn’t have to apologise; this is how she treated him before, the jokes and the snarky comments. He doesn’t want that to change, not with everything else that has fallen apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	here i am

**Author's Note:**

> Actual favourite babies. This is set at some vague point in the future, after Hannibal's arrest and Will's stint in the hospital. If at any point this becomes non-canon (glares at season two) then I am forever in denial.
> 
> Unbeta'd.

When the doctors tell him that he’s okay to leave, it’s Beverly that Will calls to pick him up. 

She arrives in a beat-up old truck, grinning brightly as she catches sight of Will waiting by the doors. After a month of blank, practised smiles, Beverly is like a gust of fresh air; real and solid and warm. “Get in, loser,” she yells, her voice bubbling with laughter, and Will complies without thinking, slips into the passenger seat with his one bag and breathes in the coffee and coconut smell that follows Beverly around like a calling card.

"You’re looking good," she tells him as she pulls off, throwing him a quick glance before looking back to the road.

Will shrugs, looking down at his hands and then across at Beverly’s face, still creased with a smile. “They had a good kitchen,” he says. It’s the truth; the food the ward served was high-quality, better than what he’d expected. Better than the standard hospital food. He wonders, mutely, if that’s true of all psychiatric institutes, or if Jack recommended a high-end one for the sake of Will’s comfort.

Beverly huffs out a laugh, says, “Any kitchen is good compared to yours.” 

It makes Will think of Hannibal. Beverly didn’t mean for it to, of course she didn’t, but there are wounds that take time to heal, and Will winces at the reminder. He tries to hide it, to clamp it down, but his body twitches involuntarily, and Beverly catches it out of the corner of her eye.

"Sorry," she says quietly. Will pulls a face, tells her it’s not her fault. She shouldn’t have to apologise; this is how she treated him before, the jokes and the snarky comments. He doesn’t want that to change, not with everything else that has fallen apart.

There’s silence for a little while, Beverly focussed on the road rather than Will, and Will watching the trees flash past through the window. He’s more tired than he’d expected - after spending the last month doing nothing more strenuous than wandering round neatly ordered gardens he feels like he should be full of energy, but he just feels drained instead. Like all the life has been sucked out of him.

Beverly breaks it. “Shit,” she mutters, out of nowhere, and Will’s gaze flicks back to her face. She’s scowling out of the windscreen, one hand rubbing at her jaw. Will is almost afraid when she turns to him, but her frown melts into an apologetic look when she meets his eyes. “I forgot to round your dogs back up.”

"What?" Will blinks at her, thrown by the admission. "Round them- what?"

"I, uh," Beverly starts, pauses, then grimaces sheepishly. "I went round to feed them just after you admitted yourself, like you asked, and they just- they looked so lonely without you there, and I figured it would be a good idea to, uh, to share them out."

Will’s eyebrows furrow in confusion. “Share them out?” he asks, completely lost. Beverly looks between Will and the road, waving one hand as though that would explain everything.

"With the team. The FBI team. We each took a couple home with us. Jimmy took Gracie, Brian took Patch and Bean, Alana took Jessie, Jack took, uh, Lulu? And I took Scar and Winston. We decided that would be better for them than spending a month alone in your house." She hesitates, glancing over at Will again. "Is that okay? Or was I just being interfering unnecessarily again?"

"You never interfere unnecessarily," Will points out without really thinking, and Beverly’s face goes soft in a way that Will has missed more than he’d like to admit. "It was a good idea," he continues before she can call him out for being a sap. "They don’t like being left on their own. I, uh- thank you."

Beverly grins again, tosses her hair away from her face. “No problem,” she tells him. “I know how important they are to you.”

Will thinks about Beverly sitting with his dogs, thinks about Beverly convincing the others to take one each, thinks about Scar and Winston curled up with her in the evening, and swallows roughly. It’s an image he could get used to, one that he’d like to see more of, he decides. “You’re important to me, too,” he says, softly.

"Damn straight I am," Beverly replies, light and easy, but she turns to flash him a fond smile after she says it, reaches across to thread their fingers together and squeeze his hand gently. Will feels warmer than he has done since he found out the truth, since he signed himself into the psych ward, and it makes him smile back at Beverly, makes him tighten his grip on her hand in return.

"C’mon, champ," she says, turning back to the road. "I’ll take you to mine - your babies miss you, they’ll be so excited you’re back. I swear, I’ve never actually seen a dog pine before, but they’ve both been practically in mourning these past few weeks."

She leaves her hand wrapped up with Will’s for the rest of the journey, and Will clings to it like a lifeline and tries to work out when exactly he started loving Beverly so desperately.


End file.
